“You know, I think purple is the perfect accent color to Laurel’s green gown,” Loni whispers from beside me as Headmaster Aldridge gives the opening remarks of the ceremony. She casts a look over her shoulder and snorts. “I just wish you’d broken a few teeth, too.”
“Aldridge told me I’m lucky to be graduating,” I mutter, but I can’t help but feel a wiggle of satisfaction when I think back to the other day. I’d just gotten back to school from a particularly awkward but emotional meeting with a grandfather I didn’t even know I had, my boobs hurt, and I was exhausted—mentally, physically, every-fucking-thing.
And of course, Laurel had started with her shit. She’d been waiting for me outside my building, one hand on her bony hip and an evil grin on her face even though I could tell she’d been crying.
That’s all she’s done since Saint died.
Walked around campus trashing my name and crying.
I had planned to walk right past her, but then she put her hands on me, and I had reacted without thinking—by headbutting her square in her pointy, expensive nose.
“Please,” Loni hisses, bringing my thoughts back to the present and graduation, “Carley would have ripped his balls off if he didn’t let you walk across that stage. Plus, you have your filthy rich grandpa in your corner now—even if he is senile.”
I manage a small smile but I don’t tell her the truth. That Phillip Jacoby might have spent the last several years in a home, but he’s still sharp and had sobbed because he recognized his son—my father—in me. I’d cried, too, because I’d spent so much time trying to learn Nora and Jenn’s past that I never tracked down links to my Benjamin.
When I told him that I’d come back to visit, Phillip said that it wouldn’t change my inheritance and that the money was still mine.
I promised to come back anyway, and he’d smiled and requested that I graduate as a Jacoby and not an Ellis.
Which is how I end up accepting my diploma a few seconds before Alondra James.
After the ceremony, I force a smile as Carley bombards me with hugs and congratulations, and I even pretend to be a normal human when she and Titus take us out for dinner. I make myself eat and play an active part in the conversation, but inside I’m screaming because I don’t know what my next move is. I don’t even know how to tell Carley about the baby, though I know I’ll have to eventually.
That’s the only decision I’m sure of anymore.
I’m grateful when Carley and Titus drive us back to campus so I can return to my room and start packing, but I don’t even make it to the elevator when my phone vibrates and I recognize the name on the screen. Chandler Branson. The attorney Saint had hired for me when I was being investigated earlier this semester.
I answer, barely able to breathe as I take the elevator up to the third floor, but Chandler keeps it short and sweet. Saint had tasked his firm with handling a real estate transaction a month before his death and he needed me to stop by his office first thing in the morning to pick up my keys.
“For?” I demand, and Chandler sucks in an exasperated breath.
“The property that Mr. Angelle purchased for you,” he explains. “A graduation gift.”
My chest is cold as I step off the elevator, and my stomach churns as I stumble toward my dorm room. “I thought you were a criminal defense attorney,” I blurted out.
“When Saint Angelle texts, I don’t hesitate to act,” he tells me, reminding me of what he said the first time I met him.
“Texted. When Saint Angelle texted.”
“Hmm. I’ll see you at 9 tomorrow morning, Miss Ellis.”
I don’t pack anything, nor do I sleep. I just pace my floor, anxiety gnawing away at me until I finally drag my tired ass into Chandler’s office the next morning. The entire process takes less than an hour, and by the time I get back into my Uber, I’m the owner of a beach cottage in Malibu.
Even though Carley’s supposed to be meeting me at my dorm in three hours so we can spend the night in a hotel room before we visit Jenn and then fly back to Georgia tomorrow, I find myself unlocking the front door of my new house thirty minutes later. It’s pretty, light and airy, but I swear my heart weighs a hundred pounds as I wander through the house.
It’s not until I cut across the patio and into the master bedroom that I realize that something is off.
That someone else is in this house with me.
I hear noises in the bathroom—the shower turning off, footsteps pounding across the floor, the sound of a deep male sigh—and my heart leaps into my throat. My Uber driver is long gone, and I am truly alone. I dart toward the French doors leading back out to the back porch, but I freeze in place when the bathroom door creaks open and a voice that makes my heart race washes over me.
“It took you long enough, little masochist.”
Over the last year and a half, I’ve dreamt of crazy shit. I’ve seen James in my dreams and Jon Eric in my nightmares, but I’ve never hallucinated them. Not like I do with Saint when I turn around and find him there, a white towel wrapped around his waist and droplets of water falling from his blond hair to his face.
“You’re not real,” I whisper, backing up as he stalks toward me, a predatory grin on his face.
“Should I show you my dick? I promise you it's not transparent or anything.”
“This is just me being hopeful.”
“I appreciate the vote of confidence, Ellis, but no—”
“This is just my fucked-up pregnancy brain playing tricks on me and—” I gasp when he finally cages me against the wall and grasps my chin between his thumb and forefinger, forcing my face to his. “Saint,” I whisper, melting into his touch, but he narrows his eyes at me, his icy blue gaze intense.
“Fucked-up pregnancy brain?” he repeats, and when I swallow hard and nod, his lips quirk. His free hand presses against my abdomen, which is still flat but his fingers spasm anyway. “You’re pregnant.”
“Saint … where have you been?”
“I’ve called you for the last month, Ellis. I’ve written you letters. Tried everything to get in touch with you without giving myself away. I’ve gone crazy trying to get to you, and you’re pregnant. With my baby.”
It’s not a question but a statement, but I nod anyway.
And to my surprise, he grins. Stares down between us at my stomach like I haven’t just revealed something that would ruin any other eighteen-year-old boy’s life.
Then again, any other eighteen-year-old boy wouldn’t be playing dead.
I could ask once again where he’s been. Really, I should ask him that, but for the first time in weeks, I feel the fire in my veins. Feel as if breathing makes sense. So, I decide to save the why and the what and the how for later and let the first words that touch my lips tumble out. “I love you, Saint.”
“Fuck, I love you too, little masochist,” he growls before pressing his lips to mine and stealing away the last of my doubt.
Bonus Epilogue 2
Saint
I didn’t mean to fucking die.
Shit just … happens sometimes.